MAMMALS - HEDGEHOG

Click to enlarge

A distinct lack of mammals this year on BG.

I derived great pleasure from this Hedgehog though, in the office courtyard.

Nicknamed "Russell" - the clever thing even climbed a bush during the floods!

Photo taken with the trusty old phone.

RANDOM MUTTERINGS

For future reference (for me).
After a brief cold snap, the weather has turned much milder again over the last day or two, the return of the wind direction to a more prevailing wind direction having much input in that.
I think all the bats are hibernating now, as are the hedgehogs.
The only bumblebees alive are the Queens in their nests - the males are probably all dead.
Warm afternoons have brought a few localised hatches of midges and I've seen only one adult Harlequin Ladybird in the last week - on November 26th - will that be the last of the year? I doubt it. I certainly haven't seen any larvae crawling around though, and many pupae have not eclosed, nor will they, I'm guessing.
One, lone Plume Moth is the only moth I've seen for a week or so.

As for my Peregrines....
After a little help from local experts, it seems like there are UP TO FIVE Peregrines in the area around Berkshire.
I know they roost/hunt at Crowthorne and Theale and Reading itself.
The pair that I took a photo of seem both wild (no jesses) and the female that I snapped is the largest Peregrine by far, round these parts. She's HUGE.

Three Peregrines (we think) regularly roost in the town centre (on the Thames Tower, where I've seen them), one of them being a falconers escaped tiercel (with jesses).
For the last two winters, this male has overwintered at Theale gravel pits, and last year attempted to nest with a 'wild' female. Sad to report that Southern Electric's helicopter put pay to that nest on one of the Theale electicity pylons. A real shame.

I seem to be the main person for reporting the birds in town - mainly because I can pass the station every day if need be, on the way to/back from work, and I look up occasionally also.

I'll keep m new camera in my bag, and keep having a look, and with luck, I'll get a decent photo or two soon...

NB. Lunchtime today - and I've just seen one lone winter butterfly (Red Admiral) on the window - so there's a few of those about in this warm spell too...

NOVEMBER FROSTS

We've had three nights of hard ground frost now, although I'm reliably informed that they shouldn't continue in the near future - the weather is set to turn much wetter, a little warmer and certainly more changeable during the back end of the month.

The office hedgehog (Russell) is now hibernating. The Harlequin Ladybirds are still out and about, but suffering sometimes from the frost and eclosing as a deformed adult - often with one elytron deformed or completely missing. Those that are still around (see photo below) are very, very sluggish. Harlequins are legendary (in America at least) for gathering in large numbers in houses - looking for shelter during the winter. That phenomenon will happen in Britain before too long - people will be reporting hundreds of ladybirds trying to get ito their houses or sheds, in a large mass.

I still haven't cleaned the birdbox out yet - I'd best do that before we get any winter roosters, if you see what I mean.... Blue Tits or Wrens rather than chickens.
Many birds have formed their winter flocks - we are visited by a dozen-strong flock of Long-Tailed Tits every day, and the Great and Blue Tits are re-discovering the feeder. I'm sure our Goldfinches and Bullfinches will be back imminently...
I might consider erecting a makeshift bird table in the vegetable plot for the cold months ahead, and see what I can attract to the garden...

Posted below are three pictures of the hard frost we experienced this morning, taken with my phone. More about that in the next post (above).

The Harlequin in the 3rd photo may well have copped it in the frost last night. That is frost on the bamboo pole it's sitting on - not lichen.

NB. 30 minutes later, and I think this Harlequin is waking up. It has lifted from the bamboo pole and the frost on its body seems to be melting... (see photograph above).

Some of these 'Harlequins' are pretty hardy. They are well used to Siberian temperatures remember...

DEAD SHREW

Took a walk along the Thames today, for about 3 hours. Fantastic warm, sunny weather. As I'm learning a lot about fungi at the moment, I thought I'd branch out and post a few photos of berries too, as I'm pretty poor at identifying them also. There seem to be plenty out at the moment, and I'll deal with them in the posts above.

The sun was warm enough today to spark off a few male Common Darters (small red dragonflies) in their hunting flights, and I also saw four young Great Crested Grebe (very late?!) and this dead shrew.

We were talking about shrews at the weekend.

Shrews are very interesting little creatures.

- They taste foul to most predators, which will play with them, possibly kill them, but not eat them.

- They are NOT rodents (like mice and rats) because they have five clawed toes on each foot like moles and hedgehogs. Rodents have four.

- They have a ridiculously high metabolic rate, and heartbeat, meaning they have to eat between 80 and 90% of their body weight each day.

- Shrews do not hibernate.

- Shrews are unusual amongst mammals in that some species are venomous and some (including our own Common Shrew (pictured below in my photo), utilise echolocation (like bats) to investigate their surroundings.

- Shrews are very afraid of loud noises. Shout at one and it will keel over from a heart attack. This was widely believed to be a country legend, as people found shrews by the side of the roads constantly and thought the traffic noise killed them. That was pooh-pooed by many people suggesting that the only reason Shrews were found and not mice, was that Shrews taste bad. That still doesn't explain why shrews were found by the sides of roads though. I guarantee you, if you play some AC/DC to a shrew, it WILL die of a heart attack!

- Shrews hold 10% of their body mass in the brain. VERY high for mammals.

Many moons ago I carried out a Shrew population survey in a local wood, for a wildlife trust.

I didn't use live traps. I caught them with my bare hands!

This is easier than it sounds. Shrews (because of their voracious appetite), need to forage pretty well constantly, and they are not quiet about it.

Very quickly, if you are doing this sort of thing a lot - (and lets face it, who doesn't), you get to know what a shrew foraging in the leaf litter sounds like.

Then you jump on it, using your arms in a circle, to prevent its escape.

(NB. At this point, I should mention, that as you fling yourself onto the woodland floor with your arms in a circle, to catch your shrew, you'd best not give a war-cry or howl, or any loud noise really - or as I've described before, you'll get your shrew, but it will be a very dead shrew).

Once you have your Shrew, you pick it up by the scruff of the neck and trim its behind with a pair of nail scissors.

You then release it and see if you catch it again...

Any culture vultures out there?

Shrew in Old English, meant a woman with a scolding, nagging tongue.

That's what Shakespeare meant by "Taming of the Shrew".

HEDGEHOG (4)

Popped out of the office last night to pick up the papers and stop them getting damp in the dense fog this morning, and I heard the courtyard Hedgehog in the leaves again.

So I snuck up on the little fella and snapped him. At least you can see its face in this photo.

I've decided to name him "Russell". Not only for the cheap pun (ooh... stop it), but to annoy my old mate Dave, who really, REALLY likes wild animals to be given human names!

Click the photo to enlarge.

HEDGEHOG (3)

I told you I'd get a photo of this Hedgehog eventually.

Well, its taken me a few weeks, and a lot of luck (I only popped outside the office tonight as I saw the security light go on, and decided to do a quick recce mission).

I didn't manage to get a great photo though, as even though the fat little niblet is almost 10" long I guess, it decided to take a little cover, and I was effectively shooting blind, in the pitch black, guided only by its rustling and snuffling noises...

So. That is the Hedgehog that lives in the little square of bushes in the middle of the office courtyard! I'll try and get another photo of it as and when, but until then, I'll leave you with some Hedgehog facts.



- Hedgehogs have approximately 6000 spines (modified hairs, brown at base, white tips).
- They have two litters of HOGLETS a year, each litter 4-5 strong.
- The hedgehogs winter nest is called a HIBERNACULUM.
- Their legs, when extended, are 4" long and can propel the little critters at a top speed of approximately 6mph for short distances.
- Hedgehogs DO have little 3/4" tails.

NB. Before you ask. I didn't attempt to sex this hedgehog...!

LIVING ON THE EDGE

You like to take risks? You like to live life on the edge? You think so, eh?!

You've got nothing on the mole that made this molehill!

Moles don't like water. They don't even like it when their tunnels flood. Who does?

There were a few of these molehills that we saw on the bank of the Thames last night, probably made by the same mole.

For your information, the mole is actually a creature of the woodland. If you, on your travels, witness molehills in fields, or on your lawn - what you are actually seeing is the handywork of an outcast mole, a mole looking to establish (eventually) its woodland territory, a nomadic mole, a young mole, a mole way down the mole pecking order.

All moles want to be in the wood.

Oh to be a dominant mole.**

**Oh to be a dominant mole.

You don't get to hear that sentence too often...

HEDGEHOG (2)

I found a VERY noisy Hedgehog last night. Only 40 yards or so from the exact location where THIS was found, on July 25th this year, before the floods and before we went to Kephalonia.
Maybe its the same individual?

I heard the little hog in the dark last night and went over to investigate. When I found him (her?) I whipped out my phone and attempted to take its photo. Unfortunately, my phone's camera settings were on landscape, no flash and infinite focus - NOT what I wanted.
As I struggled to get the settings right, the little blighter raised itself up on its stubby little pink legs and shot aross the concrete where I found it, right over my feet, and into a thick bush, where it continued to snuffle around noisily, out f the way of the strange giant with his one neon-glowing hand. (Thats my phone by the way. I haven't got a strange neon-glowing hand- though... thinking about it... I'd like one)!

I've heard and or seen this noisy little speedster for the past 2 nights now. I want its photo. I know where it lives....

Watch this space.

HEDGEHOG

Anna came down to the river tonight, to see how high it was, before I started work at 10pm.
As we walked to my office, I heard a rustling noise in a 3' high bush next to a footpath.
Upon closer inspection, it became obvious that a Hedgehog was the source of the noise.

Hedgehogs are very noisy little creatures indeed, generally, stumbling around flower beds and litter piles at night, crashing around and snuffling noisily.
Stop by a hedge at night if you hear that sort of racket, and odds on, if you look, you'll see a Hedgehog.
I do like the fact that if disturbed, they'll raise up their body on their little legs, (like one of those old citroens, remember?) and scamper away from trouble, quite fast for such little legs!

What was this Hedgehog doing 2 or 3' up a bush? I've got no idea.
Perhaps it knows a flood is coming?!

I would say it was raiding a low birds nest, but its too late in the year for that.
It is feasible I suppose, that it sleeps the day away in this spot, out of harms way in a thick bush, (hedge, really), easy to climb to, and not that high. It did seem to be surrounded by a nest of dry leaves...